Netherlands’ famed soccer club AFC Ajax Amsterdam have had one of the worst starts in their history. What is going on? The four time European champions have dominated the Eredivisie (D1 Dutch soccer league) for a long time, and especially very recently. However, they did not end up where they wanted to be last season. With long-time manager Erik ten Hag off to Manchester United, the club felt a gap grow. Ajax finished off the 2022-23 Eredivisie season in 2nd, 5 points off of title rivals PSV Eindhoven. Many fans and ultras (super fans) deemed that as inexcusable.

However, their 4-3 defeat against FC Utrecht leaves them currently in 17th, one spot away from the bottom and inside the relegation zone. With this miserable loss, their start to the season has officially been the worst in the entire club’s history. In a surprise to literary no-one, current manager Maurice Steijn left with immediate effect. 

Ajax’s business model has always been youth central—build up a fantastic squad of young talents and then sell them for as much money as possible. But over the last couple of seasons, it hasn’t necessarily been working, and now the squad is left inexperienced and now seem like they are unable to overcome adversity.

Fan behavior can also be a contributing factor to the troubles in Amsterdam. While playing their biggest game of the season, a match against fierce rivals Feyenoord (the game is often called De Klassieker—The Classic), Ajax fans began throwing flares and other objects onto the field and at the players while abysmally trailing 3-0. Other fans had even attempted a break-in into certain points in the stadium where fans have no access too.

The Feyenoord team and staff had to rush into the away team dressing room to avoid being harmed. The KNVB (Royal Dutch Football Federation) announced that the game was due to be replayed without fans because of the dangerous conditions created by the Ajax fans. The replay date was set for the 27th of September. Feyenoord won the replay 4-0.

In a questionnaire, temporary CEO Jan van Halst said that “It is a very difficult period. If only it were that easy to flick a switch and turn things around” while Dutch football pundit Jaap Stalenburg told AFP, a blog in France that: “It’s chaos, complete chaos.”

It is clear that all of the problems for Ajax originated from upstairs in the higher positions. However, former manager ten Hag leaving was not all that caused this chaos. Two months before Manchester United snatched him, Ajax’s director of football Marc Overman resigned in disgrace after some inappropriate messages were discovered which he had sent to several female colleagues. Ajax would not find his replacement until 13 months later.

Before manager Maurice Steijn was even signed to the club, ten Hag’s assistant, Alfred Schreuder had only lasted a couple months before he was sacked for some disgraceful performances. After that sacking, Johnny Heitinga was thrown into the management role until the end of the season.

In the wake of the disastrous season, former CEO Edwin van Der Sar immediately resigned from his senior position. But of course, soccer games are decided by the performances of the players, and Ajax were falling short of the world-class players they used to possess.

It is clear that everything that could have gone wrong for Ajax has quite literally gone wrong. They are a club in crisis and the fans have had enough. It also is clear that they must change their business model, transfer policy, and the positions higher up to lift the club out of the shambles that it is now. It is terrible to see a club with such royalty in European soccer history be run into the ground. The players must do better… and major changes have to be made.